Eat and Run

I have been running. A lot! Like 30 miles a week. It’s not because I’m 37 years old and beginning to feel my age, though I am. It’s not because I fear my own mortality, though I do. It’s not because I was 20 pounds overweight, though I was. It’s because I want to be able to eat whatever I want, all the time with complete disregard for the consequences.

I have the sort of personality that is prone to excess. I like to eat too much. I like to drink until I can’t walk or talk. I like to work all the time; from home, from work, from the car, days, nights, weekends.

For a long time I was obsessed with eating low carb. Eating low carb is similar to drinking too much or working too much. It’s not all fun, but it’s a means to an end. And now I’m obsessed with running. I run every day, well mostly. I have a schedule where I run every evening after work, five miles one day, three the next, then five the next, etc. Some days I run more. Some days I run less. Some times I’ll skip a day and make up the missed mileage over the next few runs.

My struggle now is that running and overeating or binge drinking don’t always go together. It’s nice to know I can eat a huge cheeseburger without worrying about the carbs or calories, but I can’t drive through and eat one on the way home because I know I’m going to run five miles when I get home. You just can’t run five miles with a belly full of cheeseburger. You also can’t run five miles drunk or even hungover for that matter. So now I find myself making choices, actual healthy choices, based on my next scheduled run.